Dark Souls II: Monster Keeper

Tales from Dark Souls - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

Having been defeated by Aava and again by the ugly siren, I decided to try another path from the forest crossroads and found myself at Aldia's Keep. On the grounds there I found Lucatiel camped by a bonfire, begging that I remember her name. We both knew she was about to hollow. While dealing with a nearby mimic (scary bastards) she vanished, and I found her again once I entered the keep proper. Only she was now Aslatiel, dressed and geared exactly the same. She was her own brother the whole time? What?

You are a confusing character.

So... was she searching for herself and ultimately lost herself during the search? Hell if I know. All I know is he/she was hostile so I turtle backstabbed her/him to death. The foyer of the keep was also devoid of guards (apart from a few that pop out of mirrors) which is worrying since there's a creep imprisoned there who tries to give me assassination jobs targeting the residents of Majula. No thanks buddy.

The whole back part of the keep is some messed up prison lab though run by strange dwarf sorcerer things. It has froggies, hounds, and hiclopsi. The real problem is when one hiclops breaks through a wall and proceeds to free the rest. Then it becomes time to FLEE! Of course by flee I mean run -through- them. This leads me straight into an aviary. Of a dragon. I should have guessed there'd be one of those caged up too.

Yes, I'm here to play!

Dark Souls II: Gesture of Friendship

Tales from Dark Souls - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

The interior of the Iron Keep is pretty well guarded by very "Eastern" knights wielding katanas who do a good job in giving me a hard time. An explorer named Magerold is here too, selling wares and talking about a shrine of dragons somewhere as well as Lucatiel who finally joins my party. I also should note this is the first area of the game that I've seen player summon signs, and get my very first co-op cleric named Lee.

The more the merrier!

The three of us make easy work of a smelter demon boss (1st go), which causes my team to disband. Lee waves vigorously as he vanishes. I only realize now that there is no actual method of communication beyond in game gestures and slow to write messages, so I spend a few minutes after the battle to learn and practice the gestures my character knows. In case you are reading this, thank you Lee!

The next area is some type of foundry which really kicks my butt with enemies knocking me into lava or just overwhelming me. Takes awhile before I find an alternate route (hard to see during combat and fire traps) above the gauntlet, defeating Oliver the Collector and finding a switch to turn off all the flame traps in the keep. Then I found the inappropriately dressed Manhunter O'Harrah nearby who accompanied me onto a lake of lava to face this guy...

Didn't Gandalf deal with you?

Dark Souls II: Crushed

Tales from Dark Souls - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

It seems Lucatiel is stalking me, and she admits as much when I find her hidden in one of the caves down here, saying she was tempted to kill me and take my souls to prolong her own time. Instead she assists me with fighting the boss of the area, who happens to also be the sculptor of these statues - a massive writhing mass of bodies called the Rotten. It flattens me a number of times before Lucatiel and I finally defeat it, earning me the third "great" soul.

A monster with a hobby: Sculpting.

Beyond him is a strange altar which warps me to a new zone but giant locked doors prevent me from advancing further. Before leaving that pit, Lucatiel advises that there are other hidden paths below which I go looking for, encountering and slaying three club wielding giants in the process. Proof that "the last giant" was also inappropriately named. There's also a strange old guy in a wheel chair down here but he's not very helpful so I just leave him there and warp back to the poison assassin forest to see if I can now explore a higher area where the staff and whip mummies were previously kicking my ass.

The answer is yes, mainly because I find Creighton the axe man and a ninja named Bashful Ray to assist! After clearing them and crossing a long, rickety rope bridge (which I managed to fall off once due to carelessness), we slew a tough red guard at which point Ray used his ninja skills to vanish. Creighton and I continued on to face a skeletal chariot! The death machine just made rounds while it patiently waited for me to kill the necros and their bone minions, then shut a gate on its face. With caution I managed to slay the bonemare after that. Alas, Creighton did not survive.

The red guard was worse than the chariot.

Maybe he is from the Elder Scrolls?

Dark Souls II: Lost and Found

Tales from Dark Souls - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

Amazing segments of beauty in an otherwise crapsack world.

As expected, all the prisoners, guards and dogs in this prison are hostile hollows. They're easy enough to deal with using basic field tactics though (like flanking and luring). I am once again jumped by the Eagle Knight here, and manage to hurt him significantly before having to flee. Fortunately he gives up the chase and vanishes - at least he didn't kill me this time!

Lucatiel has followed me here it seems, purely to give me a ring of some sort. Again, she doesn't offer to assist in any other capacity so I leave her there and find my way into the "main" prison block of Sinner's Rise - from the top I see some big winged creatures in the distance but my path leads me back down to sea level. After slaying another shiva knight I come to a massive prison of "the Lost sinner", a giant man who was so thoughtfully locked away -with- his great sword.

If he wanted invisibility he should have copied those mist bastards.

His first move is to kill all the lights with a single swing but I can still see him and his telegraphed moves just fine. I slay him on my first attempt and collect what happens to be the first of the four "great" souls. Cool. A bonfire behind him warps me back to Majula where I spend his soul purchasing the interesting rings sold by the talking cat.

Dark Souls II: Here be Pirates!

Tales from Dark Souls - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

No, I don't actually have a beard.

Feeling good from the short forest adventure with Alfis, I warped back to the dark underground dock and was joined by Bradley of the Old Guard, a tanky miracle knight. The hollow pirates and their dogs were slaughtered in waves. Lucatiel was here too, though she just wanted to talk - revealing that under her mask, she too was going hollow and that she had come to Drangleic to find her brother. Pity she didn't offer to join the party though.

Bradley could almost solo this zone I think.

Near the top Bradley and I found the mechanism to activate the local lighthouse, flooding the zone with light. Bradley stayed to guard it while I pushed on, finding that it was very handy in pushing some black, alien looking monsters into shadowier parts of the ruins. Ringing a bell at the top of the ramparts summoned a large ship to dock so it was obvious where I needed to go next.

More heads does not necessarily make you smarter!

On the way I found a strange guy just watching the boat: Carhillion the mage. He turns his nose up and refuses to speak with someone so "uneducated". I guess I was right that he's a dick. Anyway, the boat is unsurprisingly filled with more pirates. The hull is also partially flooding and contains a shiva knight (two legs that support two full torsos). It's a little intimidating but fortunately easy to read, and after slaying it on my first attempt I inadvertently sail the huge ship to a nearby fortress island ... the Lost Bastille.

Dark Souls II: Weakness: Woman therefore try rear

Tales from Dark Souls - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

Are you this game's Solaire?

Player messages never fail to amuse.

My forays into the fortress don't go too well, though on a lower floor I meet Lucatiel, a lady wearing a bearded mask. She is impressed that I still want to talk to her even though she's actively trying to get people to stay away. I also find an anti-poison ring near her which is handy, but the local sorceress guards are simply too much for me so I withdraw back to Majula. Interestingly, Chloanne is here too now - and it turns out she is blacksmith Lenigrast's missing daughter.

Taking another path from town leads me to a small jail house where I meet the warrior, Benhart of Jugo. Apparently he can't advance since the lever is stuck. Stuck because a person got turned to stone right in front of it. There have been a few petrified people around, and it requires a special item to release them. Since I had one I freed the woman, who introduced herself as Rosibeth - apprentice mage to the great Carhillion. Can't be that great if he couldn't unpetrify his own student. That and/or he's a dick.

After giving her some better rags I send her off to Majula and pull the lever which opens ALL the jail doors. Zombie swarm! Yeah, that didn't go well for me. Much better on the second attempt. Beyond the jail was a crossroad with two paths leading to locked doors and one into a misty forest of cheaters. Cheaters who have the same color as the fog. My best defense? No defense! Just sprinting!

I can't see them, but they sure can see me!